Marking a new chapter in the history of one of the world's greatest films, the release of Abel Gance's Napoleon is the culmination of a project spanning 50 years. Academy Award-winning film historian Kevin Brownlow and the BFI National Archive have completed a new digitally restored version of this cinematic triumph, and audiences will be able to experience this extraordinary film complete with Carl Davis's magnificent score when the released on DVD & Blu-ray in November. Originally conceived by its director as the first of 6 films about Napoleon, this five and a half hour epic features full scale historical recreations of episodes from his personal and political life, from the French Revolution to the heroic arrival of French troops in Italy that marked the beginning of the First Italian campaign of 1796. Utilizing a number of groundbreaking camera and editing techniques, Abel Gance's Napoleon offers one of the most richly rewarding and thrilling experiences in the history of cinema, a brilliant pairing of music and film, comparable to grand opera in its intensity, offering dazzling scenes of unparalleled brilliance.
A heartfelt epic from Irish director Neal Jordan (The Crying Game, Interview with the Vampire), Michael Collins is the biography of the charismatic and controversial Irish rebel leader who led the fight for independence from Britain. Among the most beautiful and atmospherically photographed movies of the 1990s, Michael Collins is also a rich and intelligent study of the nature of politics and leadership: the IRA spokesman, full of fiery convictions, eventually gives way to the more mature negotiator who strives to reach a compromise solution and is politically undone in the process. Liam Neeson gives a grand and towering performance as Collins, but for all the character's legendary, heroic, or otherwise larger-than-life attributes, Jordan and Neeson also keep him human. This is sweeping historical filmmaking of the kind we haven't seen since the heyday of David Lean, but with Jordan's characteristic touches of complexity and ambivalence. --Jim Emerson
Prisoner Cell Block H: Volume 3 (8 Discs)
Directed by Kyle Patrick Alvarez, The Stanford Prison Experiment recounts the true story of a notorious 1971 psychological test at Stanford University, in which 24 students played the role of prisoners and prison guards, conducted by Professor of Psychology Philip Zimbardo. Starring Billy Crudup as Philip Zimbardo, plus Michael Angarano, Ezra Miller and Tye Sheridan. The Stanford Prison Experiment is already a double award winner at the 31st Sundance Film Festival, including the Waldo Salt Screenwriting Award for writer Tim Talbott. Click Images to Enlarge
Both a critical and ratings success on its original ITV transmission The Sandbaggers was lauded in 2003 by the New York Times as being ""The best spy series in TV history"". 'The Sandbaggers' is a nickname for the Special Section of the British Secret Service - a team of special agents who were deployed during the Cold War. Run by the dour single-minded Neil Burnside (Roy Marsden) the 'Sandbaggers' are headed by the brash but conscientious Willie Caine (Ray Lonnen). In a game of cat-and-mouse between foreign powers the stakes are high and the chances of a Sandbagger being killed in action is not small. An ex-Sandbagger himself Burnside must try to keep his operatives alive while contending with the political machinations and dictates of the government. Features the complete third series. Episodes Comprise: 1. All In A Good Cause 2. To Hell With Justice 3. Unusual Approach 4. My Name Is Anna Wiseman 5. Sometimes We Play Dirty Too 6. Who Needs Enemies 7. Opposite Numbers
Rebellious Catholic schoolgirls hidden secrets and a controversial romance all unfold in the newest addition to the lesbian cult classic canon. Loving Annabelle is the controversial story of a Catholic boarding school teacher who has an affair with her female student Annabelle. Inspired by the 1931 German classic 'Maedchen In Uniform ' director Katharine Brooks's 'Loving Annabelle' gives a modern telling of the forbidden love story that continues to be controversial to this day.
Sex, bondage, and butterflies: two women explore the extremes of carnal desire in this kinky, deliciously twisted tale of erotic obsession.
The Son's Room, which picked up the 2001 Palme d'Or at Cannes, marks a departure for writer-director Nanni Moretti. The films that made his name outside Italy, Dear Diary and Aprile, were both highly personal and politicised semi-documentaries, and a strong political sense underlies the half-dozen or so features he made before them. By contrast, The Son's Room is a subtle, intense study of a family cracking apart under the impact of grief, with no overt political element. For all that, it's the most moving film that Moretti's yet made. "It captured me" he says "more than any other [story] I'd worked on previously. It's a film in which the director shares his emotions with the audience, without imposing his own feelings." As usual, the director plays his own lead character. Here he's Giovanni, a successful psychiatrist in a provincial Italian city (Ancona on the Adriatic coast). He has a beautiful wife, happy in her own career, and two bright, good-looking teenage children, a son and a daughter. Then, out of nowhere, tragedy strikes and in its aftermath, the fissures begin to show in the idyllic façade. Giovanni in particular reveals the insecurities and neuroses lurking behind his tolerant, easy-going demeanour. Moretti homes in on his characters with clear-eyed compassion, never milking the tragedy for facile sentiment but sparing us nothing of the gut-wrenching grief they feel. Nor does he succumb to the temptation of a feel-good happy ending: we are left with a hint of hope for the future, but no more. This is intelligent, mature filmmaking that respects its audience. On the DVD: The Son's Room comes to disc with just the trailer--and the flabby US trailer at that. A commentary from Moretti would have been more than welcome. Still, the transfer, in the original 1.66:1 ratio, is impeccable, with Dolby Digital 2.0 sound to match. --Philip Kemp
""A great movie!"" -Pauline Kael The New Yorker. John Travolta (Pulp Fiction Face/Off) stars in this riveting mystery/thriller filled with powerful performances intense action and an ""engrossing web of suspense and intrigue"" (Blockbuster Entertainment Guide). Written and directed by master filmmaker Brian De Palma (Mission: Impossible) Blow Out is a heart-stopping adventure hailed by Rolling Stone as ""an American moviemaking triumph!"" Jack Terri (Travolta) is a talented audio tech
To impress his Fascist friends Marcello plans to assassinate his former professor now considered a subversive. A blend of thriller psychological portrait and political parable The Conformist found Bertolucci on peak form and the resulting stylistic tour de force paved the way for the likes of Scorsese Schrader and Michael Mann.
It's all for one and one for all in this heartwarming comedy about the childhood mischief of four best friends who reunite after twenty years. Roberta Teeny Samantha and Chrissy have been busy growing up but they always remembered the promise they made to be there for each other. Now they're together again to relive the greatest summer of their lives.
How To Marry A Millionaire (1953) Marilyn delivers one of the finest comedic performances of her career in this outrageously funny film co-starring Betty Grable and Lauren Bacall! Three beautiful models plan to snag rich husbands by pooling their funds and renting a posh Manhattan penthouse in which to lure their victims. What follows is a series of near-marital mishaps where love prevails over money proving that even gold-diggers sometimes have hearts of gold! There's N
Follows a pair of married couples, Alfie (Hopkins) and Helena (Jones), and their daughter Sally (Watts) and husband Roy (Brolin), as their passions, ambitions, and anxieties lead them into trouble and out of their minds.
The Fireman s Ball (DVD & BD)
Karen McCann's orderly life is shattered when a stranger breaks into her home and murders her 17-year-old daughter. But shock and grief turn into rage and disbelief when the killer is released on a legal technicality. When he commits another murder and is set free once again Karen is determined to make him pay for his crimes.
A collection of inimitably uproarious comedies from Spanish icon Pedro Almodovar! Flower Of My Secret (1995): Leo (Paredes) leads a secret double life as an author of romantic fiction. However despite her success as the best-selling Amanda Gris her husband doesn't love her her best friend is strangely distracted and her mother and sister are too busy bickering to notice that anything's wrong. Abandoned by her muse and seeking solace in the bottle since the collapse of her ma
Three London gentlemen take a vacation rowing down the Thames, encountering various mishaps and misadventures along the way.Tracing the Source: An interview with Jeremy NicholasMessing Around on the River: An interview with Matthew SweetB&W Stills GalleryOriginal Trailer
One of the most sublimely silly products to emanate from Roger Corman's studio, The Raven has the very loosest of connections with the Edgar Allen Poe poem that gives it its title and which Vincent Price intones sepulchrally at the beginning. A retiring magician, Craven (Price) has opted out of the power struggles of peers such as Dr Scarabus (Boris Karloff) to brood on his dead wife and bring up his daughter. The arrival of Bledlo (Peter Lorre), an incompetent drunk whom Scarabus has turned into the raven of the title, involves him in everything he had renounced--life is complicated further by the arrival of Bledlo's son Rexford, played by a staggeringly young Jack Nicholson. The special effects are almost perfunctory, yet the culminating magical duel between Price and Karloff is inventive and charming; this is one of those films that looks as if the actors enjoyed making it; while the script by Richard Matheson has a blithe awareness of its own shortcomings that makes it hard to dislike. On the DVD: The Raven comes to DVD with very boxy remastered mono sound, but is presented in its original widescreen 2.35:1 ratio, formatted for 16:9 TVs. The only extra is the original theatrical trailer. --Roz Kaveney
21 grams is the weight we lose when we die, and this moving drama tells of three very different people brought together by the common bond of death.
Joseph Losey's lurid and often misunderstood drama stars the great Elizabeth Taylor (Suddenly, Last Summer) as an ageing London prostitute who befriends a young woman (Mia Farrow, See No Evil) that reminds her of her long-dead daughter. As the bizarre relationship between the two evolves, the appearance of Robert Mitchum (Cape Fear), as Farrow's abusive stepfather, ignites deep emotions and dark passions. With its exquisite production design, stylish cinematography and elegant score, Joseph Losey's lost masterpiece finally makes its long-overdue premiere on Blu-ray. Product Features High Definition remaster Original mono audio Audio commentary with authors and critics Dean Brandum and Alexandra Heller-Nicholas (2019) Archival Interview with Joseph Losey (1969, 15 mins): extract from the French television programme Cinéma critique, featuring the celebrated director promoting the release of Secret Ceremony and an appreciation by critic Michel Mourlet The Beholder's Share (2019, 25 mins): interview with Gavrik Losey, son of Joseph Losey TV version: additional scenes (1971, 18 mins): unique epilogue and prologue produced for US television screenings, with Robert Douglas and Michael Strong Original theatrical trailer Larry Karaszewski trailer commentary (2015, 3 mins): short critical appreciation Image gallery: promotional and publicity material New and improved English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
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